Scenes pass and nobody moves, everyone as entranced by the spectacle as she is. Maria looks around at the group, bundled together under the blue light that flares and deepens as the camera changes its viewpoint. There doesn’t seem to be that many of them, now that she can see everyone gathered together, a small crew of drifting souls, all reaching to gain purchase on something solid and worthwhile, and the thought strikes her that if a fire consumed the building and they were all trapped inside, would anyone actually notice? Everyone here claiming they were in fact somewhere else.
The film as she remembered it is an intense psychological drama set in a space station, but viewing it here elicits ripples of laughter throughout its small audience. The flimsy and narrow spaceship tunnels, the claustrophobia and intense desire for privacy, the reassuring fantasies the characters cling to, the great, looming, all-controlling planet outside, all so close to their own experience that they have no option but to titter in recognition. Take the sound away and political allegory becomes satire.
Maria allows herself to be swept along by the motion and rhythm of the camera. She’s never done this before, too distracted by the narrative, but now she pays attention to the cutting pattern, the length of a shot, and she looks at the outside of the frame, rejecting where the director wants you to look, seeing instead a blurry stair rail or desk lamp; the smudged, unfocused items on the periphery that hold their own quiet captivations. Watching it is like reading a child’s picture book: no words to pay attention to, just the language of images.
They take a break at the end of the first reel and people spill into the corridor, smoking and talking, and there’s a queue for the toilet and Maria sees Pavel hovering around the door.
“You look lovely.”
“Thanks. You look late.”
“I know, I’m sorry.”
Pavel holds up a bottle he’s brought and pours a swig into Maria’s glass, locates one for himself, and blows the dust out of it. He pours and puts the cap back on and lays the bottle on the floor, clamping it between his feet, and they clink glasses and sip and Pavel looks around the room and Maria looks into her glass, swirling the liquid.
“How long is it since we’ve done this?” he asks.
“Done what?”
“Shared a drink.”
Maria pauses, thrown slightly off kilter.
“I don’t know. Maybe five years?”
She could have come to him. When the trouble started with the newspaper. Pavel would have given advice. She could trust him. Why didn’t she lay more faith in others? Pride maybe, she thinks. She doesn’t like to show her weaknesses. Pavel has always been loyal to her, even if they let a long time pass without seeing each other. She didn’t ask him to dig out a teaching role for her; he was aware of her situation and just called her up one day. At first she wondered if his kindness had a motive to it, if he was perhaps trying to rekindle things, but no, there’s never been an underlying edge to their conversations.
She draws him into a corner.
“What do you know about Chernobyl?”
“Why?”
“It’s begun to interest me. What have you heard?”
“Probably the same as you. Of course, I don’t directly know anyone who has been there. It’s all hearsay. But, yes, there’s been talk.”
“Such as?”
“I don’t know. Wild tales, odd tales. The animals have been affected, rabid wolves are populating the forests, two-headed calves being born in the local farms. Fairy-tale stuff.”
“So you don’t think there’s any truth in them?”
“I really don’t know. A West German kid lands a plane in Red Square—who would have believed that one if there weren’t so many around to see it?”
“Anything else?”
“A colleague of mine, his cousin works as a night porter in one of the hospitals in Kiev. They’ve been bringing the cleanup workers there. There are sections of the hospital that even the doctors refuse to enter.”
“And? A porter has more than one story.”
“Well, he talked about a girl in Belarus who was brushing her hair. Eleven years old with beautiful, long pigtails, and she’s preparing for bed, running a wide brush through her hair, holding it with one hand and brushing with the other, and the whole handful just dislodges from her head. She’s bald within thirty seconds. This is what they’re saying.”
Pavel raises his eyebrows in conclusion, takes another drink. “But if you ask me, a porter is a job with plenty of gossip time.”
Maria transfers her glass to her other hand. “Grigory’s there.”
Pavel’s eyes widen. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“I called to him after we met at Lenin Hills. I hadn’t seen him in months. He was gone.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“No. I can’t find out where he is. I’ve spoken to anyone who might know. Nothing.”
She says this and her face buckles.
Pavel draws her to his shoulder. She stays there, forehead pressed against his collarbone. Breathing deeply.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’ll ask around, I have some medical friends who have sway in the Ministry of Health. I’ll get them to find some details.”
Maria steps back. Nothing to wipe her eyes with, so she uses her hands.
“Be careful about it. I don’t want anyone to draw attention to him.”
“Okay. I will.”
The crowd clusters in again and the second reel of the film is loaded and plays, but Maria can’t pay attention anymore. Her eyes stray from the screen. Instead she looks at the beam coming from the projector, dust swirling through it, the past floating everywhere.
When the film finishes, people stand and stretch, unrolling their vertebrae, cigarettes still dangling from their lips. Maria’s eyes itch from the smoke.
Pavel takes her elbow. “There’s someone I want you to meet. If you’re up to it?”
She nods.
They enter a room further down the corridor. This one is filled with portable steel racks, about two metres high, presumably the cooling room for the baked bread.
A man in his early forties is standing alone, inspecting the employee notices, still pinned to the walls.
He turns. His clothes are well cut, hair swept back from his forehead, an impressive bearing, a firm handshake.
“Danil is a lawyer who looks for honest ways of practicing the law. If a writer needs to arrange an exit visa or begin the rehabilitation process to get his name cleared, Danil is the one we turn to for advice.”
“I see.”
Danil has assured, intelligent eyes.
“I’m presuming you’re not here for the film, Danil.”
“No, I’m not.”
He draws a flyer from his pocket, a small white rectangle of paper, clumsy block print.
Maria reads it. It’s a strike-appeal leaflet for the plant Maria works in, requesting that workers meet at the main gates in ten days’ time, just before the morning shift begins. They intend to march through the factory and on to the main road, which they’ll follow all the way into the city.
Maria has seen hundreds of these already. They’ve been leaving them on streetcars and trains on the way into the plant. Workers pass them around on their walk home. Nestor, in particular, is very excited. He’s expecting that at the very least the factory board will appoint a new set of union officials. He claims they may even reinstate Zinaida Volkova. Maria has stopped arguing with him.
“What do you think?” Danil asks.
Maria looks at Pavel, asking if she can trust this man. Pavel nods.
“If they want to strike, then let them,” she says.